Saturn Moon Landing

[R. Richard]

European Probe Lands on Saturn's Moon

DARMSTADT, Germany - A European space probe has landed on the surface of Saturn's moon Titan, a space official said Friday, buoying hopes that the mission would produce data that could shed light on the origins of life on Earth.

Mission controllers know the Huygens probe made a soft landing by parachute because it is still transmitting steadily long after it was to have landed, said David Southwood, the European Space Agency's science director.

"We know that it has landed based on the laws of gravity," Southwood said. "It simply cannot still be flying. It's got to be on a solid surface, and it must soft landed."

Southwood said the early signal showed little more than that Huygens was still alive, and said the mission wouldn't be a success until a full set of data could be sent back via the Cassini mother ship orbiting Saturn.

"We still can't fully celebrate — we need to wait for the data to come from Cassini but we have enormous faith in this mission," Southwood said.

The heart of Huygens' mission was its 2 1/2-hour parachute descent, during which it was to take pictures and sample the atmosphere, believed to resemble that of the Earth when it was young, and to offer potential clues about how life arose on Earth. Early signals confirmed it had powered up for entry and deployed the parachute.

Officials were optimistic because Huygens was designed to transmit for at least three minutes after landing before its batteries died — a total of less than three hours. But the signal had kept coming for more than five hours.

"It's lasted much longer than we ever dreamed," Southwood said

 

[domjoe]

This, to quote Patrick Moore, is absolutely incredible.

Really, Titan is probably the most exciting object in the solar system after earth. If they find sufficiently complex hydrocarbons there (which would be possible if there were volcanic activity to contribute heat), it would make it far more likely that carbon based life exists elsewhere in the universe.

(twists and contorts for a moment like William Shatner).

 

[ABSTRUSE]

cool..........I saw in last nights paper about it but I did't know it had landed.
Can't wait to hear what they find out!

 

[domjoe]

Astro-babe from European Space Agency explains the mission: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/VideoTalk/SEM27KXDE2E_0.html

 

[ABSTRUSE]

Astro-babe from European Space Agency explains the mission: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/VideoTalk/SEM27KXDE2E_0.html

Thanks Joe, that was cool.

 

[Alex De Kok]

For those of us in the UK, there's an hour-long program on the landing due to be broadcast at 11.30 this evening on BBC2.

I'll be watching!

Alex

 

[she_is_my_addiction]

[No message]

 

[domjoe]

That's exactly my attitude to war. A much greater expense than the Cassini mission, and a lot more pointless.

 

[she_is_my_addiction]

[No message]

 

[Guest]

But it's by exploring more of our solar system that we are learning more about our own planet.

You want us to remain insular and not entertain the notion that there could be other life out there, and more to learn than we could ever imagine?

Don't you think it might help unify us as a planet?

I think we owe it to future generations to do so.

As Joe said, money is wasted in other areas.

Lou

 

[she_is_my_addiction]

[No message]

 

[Guest]

Nope, I don't think it will unify us anymore than September 11th did. We were unified for about a year. Lol. And we aren't insular about space. We know a lot. I'd like to see more funding for the AIDS issue, more Habitat for Humanity, more funding for programs like Americorps instead of cutting back for more space crap.

www.americorps.gov

It's always about the USA, isn't it?

Read the thread title, this is a European Space probe.

 

[she_is_my_addiction]

[No message]

 

[Guest]

Nope I think we need something more unifying world-over. There need to be more programs like these all over the place.

And I did read the title.

So why, in your reply to me, did you only mention the USA?

And, September 11th unfied the world, did it? I don't think so.

So insular. So sad. My point.

 

[Subo97]

american Space nut

grateful for our European friends for advancing the frontiers of human knowledge. I told my 7th grade science classes to go home and google Huygens today, thankful that somebody in this world put something in the news i would actually want them to see.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

So why, in your reply to me, did you only mention the USA?

And, September 11th unfied the world, did it? I don't think so.

So insular. So sad. My point.

Some of us are excited about it Lou. I personally wish more money went to the funding of pure sciences that have little or no political BS attached. there is very little we can leave to future generations and say we all had a hand in it. At least here, it's something good we leave.

 

[shereads]

And we're going to need a way off this planet at the rate we're going.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

Some of us are excited about it Lou. I personally wish more money went to the funding of pure sciences that have little or no political BS attached. there is very little we can leave to future generations and say we all had a hand in it. At least here, it's something good we leave.

Colly, I'm just curious. Do you have any idea of what's NASA's yearly budget these days?

 

[shereads]

This kind of project is a lot more exciting than the Space Shuttle had become. That, and the whole Space Station thing have become rather pointless public relations boondoggles, so intent upon proving that manned space flight is practical and only occasionally fatal, that we spend enormous amounts of money to include a high school science classe's pet experiment. And gain what?

It's tempting to wish that all of the expense and effort of space exploration were poured into solving problems "down here." But there's plenty of waste in the world economy without pinpointing these deep-space probes as the problem.

The practical application of the knowledge aside (its applications may not be known for decades anyway) how can we not be united when we're reminded how tiny we are, huddled together on this fragile dot of a planet? And how amazing we are, that some of us have been able to leave it and explore on everyone's behalf.

It hasn't been that long ago, in context of our species' existence, that people were being sentenced to death for claiming that the earth wasn't the center of the solar system. (The USA is the center of the solar system. Heehee. Kidding.) And now we're driving around out there. Cool.

 

[shereads]

Colly, I'm just curious. Do you have any idea of what's NASA's yearly budget these days?

NASA and "pure science" don't mesh somehow.

Colly, when you say you'd like to see funding for pure science free of political b.s., do you mean a sort of global coalition? It would be nice to see all of the world's financial powers contributing to some sort of independently governed entity devoted to research, with all players having equal access to whatever was learned. Or is that the premise of Star Trek?

 

[shereads]

I just hope we don't land on a tiny civilisation and squish it.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Colly, I'm just curious. Do you have any idea of what's NASA's yearly budget these days?

Last I checked it had been cut dramatically. there was some wraongling on capital hill to put some back in to try and get the shuttles operating again. I'll admit I haven't kept up with it enough to know if that got through or not.

 

[Lauren Hynde]

NASA and "pure science" don't mesh somehow.

Colly, when you say you'd like to see funding for pure science free of political b.s., do you mean a sort of global coalition? It would be nice to see all of the world's financial powers contributing to some sort of independently governed entity devoted to research, with all players having equal access to whatever was learned. Or is that the premise of Star Trek?

Babylon 5

I was just asking about NASA's budget because I know the ESA's budget is little over 3000 millions and wanted to have some sort of perspective of how much that is worth. I also think the ESA may be a good enterprise model for what you were talking about...

 

[Colleen Thomas]

NASA and "pure science" don't mesh somehow.

Colly, when you say you'd like to see funding for pure science free of political b.s., do you mean a sort of global coalition? It would be nice to see all of the world's financial powers contributing to some sort of independently governed entity devoted to research, with all players having equal access to whatever was learned. Or is that the premise of Star Trek?

I mean pure science, research that will yield information that is free and open to all researchers. Raw information that is open to interpretation and will spawn new questions while changeing old assumptions. Something where joint projects like the Huygens probe allow everyone to participate in the joy of discovery and allows great minds to share ideas, reguardless of the status of Nations.

You don't see these guys hoarding information, they are releaseing photos and a lot more to the average person. the average person may be unable to aplly the information in a meaningful way, but scientists the world over have access to it, even if their own country can't afford to lift a probe into space.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

Babylon 5

I was just asking about NASA's budget because I know the ESA's budget is little over 3000 millions and wanted to have some sort of perspective of how much that is worth. I also think the ESA may be a good enterprise model for what you were talking about...

A quick google says Nasa's 2005-10 budget is 16.2 billion